Vista SP1 beta released to testers

SP1 has been released to beta testers around the world. So far, no one has torrented it.

Many people are awaiting the arrival of SP1 before they switch to Vista with the expectations that it will bring the massive improvements that SP1 did for XP. That same group of people may just be sadly disappointed. On Monday, Microsoft began releasing SP1 to beta testers around the globe, so details of just what is include have been popping up.

The update runs in the range of 51MB to 679.6MB but many places suggest that it's closer to the former than to the latter. Some performance issues have been cleared up such as better responsiveness upon logging in and virtually no wait between hitting CTRL+ALT+DEL and getting to the task menu. The update is focused mainly on enhancing features already in the OS rather then adding a boatload of new features.

"I've also taken notice to improvements in overall responsiveness of my PCs. Improvements were also noticeable in resuming from Hibernation or Sleep on both my desktop PC and laptop running SP1. I discovered copying files from one directory to another is a bit faster. And on my laptop - battery life seems to be improved since running SP1," said Brandon LeBlanc over on the Windows Vista blog.

"I have also noticed that transferring files to my shares on my Windows Home Server are a bit faster than they were previously without SP1. Overall performance in accessing my mapped network shares is improved as well. I store quite a bit of data on my Windows Home Server so this was a huge plus for me. These are just some of the performance improvements I've seen running SP1 so far."

Wireless connectivity and dual monitor issues on laptops seems to have been addressed as well, with many reporting better connectivity and functionality between the two.

Of course, SP1 also includes the requisite rollup of all security updates since the launch of Vista. A full detailed list of just what is included can be found over in Microsoft's Knowledge Base.

Were you one of the lucky few that managed to download SP1? Tell us your thought on it over in the forums or in the comment section below.

Share This News Story

13 Comments

Well I hope they sort out the LAN connectivity, sometimes have to waits ages for vista to detect the LAN which I find is very annoying, even with manual network settings applied.
Most the improvements in SP1 I see dont effect me toomuch on a powerfull desktop machine, im sure if I was running a laptop, then SP1 improvments might be more noticable.

how about clogging resources? the *rumoured* memory leak? does it stil eat up half a gig of RAM just to stay running? will running a few media player and browsing internet will cough up 1Gb of system resource?

i have 2Gb of RAM so it never really was a threat, but with games eating up 1~1.5Gb of RAM by themselves, i can see this to be problematic with newer games.........

SP1 didn't really do much for XP - as with the Vista SP1, it was mainly patches and bugfixes. SP2 is what gave XP the real functionality boost.

As for Vista eating up RAM, this is part of the OS functionality, and has been widely documented since Vista's release. If applications demand RAM that the OS is using for caching purposed, I believe it will be released for that application to use.

Originally Posted by FlibblebotSP1 didn't really do much for XP - as with the Vista SP1, it was mainly patches and bugfixes. SP2 is what gave XP the real functionality boost.

As for Vista eating up RAM, this is part of the OS functionality, and has been widely documented since Vista's release. If applications demand RAM that the OS is using for caching purposed, I believe it will be released for that application to use.

When XP came out there were compatibility issues, it was slow, etc etc etc - hell they even complained about it on the BBC
SP1 actually fixed loads of the initial problems (well rolled it up into a neat package) and made the OS far more usable

However, vista SP1 doesn't have so many gaping flaws, and As far as i have read, SP1 really wont make a difference, if you don't like vista now, SP1 really wont change that

I really want them to add 1 feature to SP1 for Vista, just one. That would be the ability to turn clear(fuzzy)type off on ALL sections of the OS, the current behaviour only turns it off on things like icon text but there are sections in which it remains on and I HATE it.

I hope it lets my optical drives frigging work, I thought it was the drives so I got them replaces and the new ones have the same issue with it. And when I run the firmware update from pioneer it says it can't update them!

AND, most annoyingly of all, when I tell it not to alert me of security notices, it still god damn well does and it never recongonises it when i tell it not to!

Originally Posted by BioSniperI really want them to add 1 feature to SP1 for Vista, just one. That would be the ability to turn clear(fuzzy)type off on ALL sections of the OS, the current behaviour only turns it off on things like icon text but there are sections in which it remains on and I HATE it.

Where won't it turn off? It hasn't bothered me yet, and I usually get a headache when reading it for extended periods.:o
Maybe it just isn't anywhere I would read for long :)

Originally Posted by RambleI think they've fixed that already mate.
There's some other fixes on the MS website that are real hard to find where you need to apply a kernel update.

I've tried all of them and none have worked for me. I'm starting to think it might be a bug in MCE rather than Vista as transfers are only slow between these two PCs (but MCE to XP is fine :(). And I'm pretty sure there's still the bug where transfer speeds drop when you start playing audio.

Log in

You are not logged in, please login with your forum account below. If you don't already have an account please register to start contributing.